Nineteen percent of US office-based physicians refuse to see drug and device industry sales reps, according to a recent analysis conducted by healthcare marketing firm SK&A Information Services.

Another 22.7% require reps to set an appointment, the survey found. “The old days of walking into an office and bumping into the doctor are waning,” Dave Escalante, SK&A president said in a statement. “Today's industry sales reps will have more success with product detail efforts if they understand and adhere to these new physician access protocols and visitation standards.”

The SK&A study was based on a telephone survey of 180,000 doctors during the fourth quarter of 2007.

About 5% of surveyed physicians will visit with reps only on specific days of the week and 3.2% have restricted their access to reps to specific times of the day with lunch time being the most popular.

Meanwhile, nearly 73% of physicians surveyed will take details from reps at any time of day or any day of the week, the survey said. SK&A's study was performed in the fourth quarter 2007. The firm said it plans to continue the survey until it has called all 656,000 practicing physicians in its database. The first report covering all physicians is scheduled to be complete and available in the second quarter 2008.